This was not the worst of it, either. Dasher, forgetting that simplicity of his forefathers which had promoted his fortunes, learnt on his marriage to launch out into unheard-of extravagances, spending his hardly-gained substance in riotous living. He kept open house in town and country, getting laughed at, en parenthese, by the toadies who spunged upon him; failed; got into "the Gazette;" and?--died of a broken heart. Poor Dasher! On the death of her other half--it is problematical which half he was, whether better or worse--Lady Dasher found herself left with a couple of daughters and a few thousands, which her husband had taken care to settle on her so as to be beyond the reach of his creditors. The provision was ample to have enabled her to live in comfort, if she had practised the slightest economy; but, never having learnt that species of common sense, called "savoir faire," which is useful in every-day life, Lady Dasher soon outran the constable. She then had to appeal to her father, Earl Planetree, who, now that poor Dasher disgraced the family escutcheon no longer by living, acknowledged her once more, relieving her necessities; and when he, too, died, he bequeathed her a fair income, on which, by dint of hard struggling, she contrived to support existence and repine at her bitter lot. She was in the habit of telling people--who, between ourselves, were hopelessly ignorant that such a person as the late earl had ever breathed, and cared less, probably, about the fact--that had her poor papa been yet alive, things would have been "very different with her;" an assertion of questionable accuracy. There are some persons in this world who can never by any possibility take a rose-coloured view of life. No matter what vivid touches the great painter puts in on the canvas of their every-day being, they always remain mentally colour-blind, and perceive but one monotonous neutral tint--as they will continue to do until the end, when, perchance, their proper sight may be restored. Lady Dasher was one of these. She persisted in taking a despondent view of everything around her--her past, her future, her position, her prospects; nay, even the circumstances and surroundings of her friends and few intimates came to be regarded in the same unsatisfactory light. She was unacquainted with the healthy tone of wisdom contained in the old quatrain,-- "That man, I trow, is doubly blest, Who of the worst can make the best; And he, I'm sure, is doubly curst, Who of the best doth make the worst!" Morbid and melancholic had been her disposition at the commencement of the chapter:--morbid and melancholic she would naturally remain to its close.